Shares at the Pakistan Stock Exchange plunged on Wednesday amid no progress on a Staff Level Agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as the program deadline of June 30 inches closer.
At close, the benchmark index settled at 40,220.8, a fall of 432.23 points or 1.06%.
According to analysts Economic uncertainty, dismal data on foreign direct investment, which fell by 21pc for Jul-May 2023, and IMF bailout program delays acted as catalysts in today’s bearish close.
Also read: Pakistan seeks US help to revive stalled IMF program
Sectors painting the benchmark KSE-100 Index in red included chemical (65.74 points), oil and gas exploration (51.36 points) and technology and communication (50.81 points).
Volume on the all-share index dropped to 97 million from 124.9 million on Tuesday, while the value of shares traded dropped to Rs3.6 billion from Rs4 billion recorded in the previous session.
WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 11.7 million shares followed by BankIslami with 7.9 million shares and Shell Pakistan with 4.7 million shares.
Shares of 323 companies were traded on Wednesday, of which 69 registered an increase, 231 recorded a fall and 23 remained unchanged.
